Poll: Vermonters Say Yes to Vermont Yankee, Single-Payer Health Care

1. I am suspect of polling…so you questioned a small group of Vermonters and said the results are the voice of all Vermonters? This is just more media trash and disinformation. Propaganda is result of polls taken without disclosing ALL the information analyzed. Will the propagandists give us that info? No! They want to sway opinion. Period!!!

2. Ignore.

3. Murphy:1) “why is it “Entergy’s” burden, and not the utilities’ burden, or at least both sides’ burden, to successfully negotiate contracts?” Because in this instance, Entergy had more of an interest in doing so than the utilities, since their continued existence depended on it, and the utilities had no such dependency. That’s why. Entergy certainly had the option to reject this “burden” and negotiate as though they faced no such threat, and they chose to do so. All I’m saying is that it was a dumb choice, from THEIR point of view. From my perspective, I’m delighted they chose the course they did.2) “… your theory that if VY had successfully negotiated contracts with the Vermont utlities VY would be relicensed by now and we’d all be happy.” Just for the record, YOU’D be happy. I wouldn’t.3) “… by the beginning of the legislative session in January, 2009, if not earlier, the political climate against VY was already so hostile that Shumlin and Smith felt at liberty to attempt to interfere with and minipulate the PRIVATE contract negotiations between VY and the utilities.? Evidence? To my knowledge: NONE. Counter evidence: why would Entergy and Douglas be demanding a vote if the climate was as hostile as you suggest?2) “Second, there was no rational basis for the so-called contract deadline. It was completely arbitrary and artificial.” The deadline was in relation to a legislative vote demanded by Douglas and Entergy. It was perfectly rational, and totally normal.The respective leaders of each house of the Vermont legislature set deadlines, including crossover dates, for most if not all legislation in every session. That’s part of their job as leaders.Shumlin and Smith did NOT “interfere” with negotiations; they told everyone when they needed a key piece of information in order to schedule a vote demanded by Entergy and Douglas. The deadline, which was announced in February, was well into the legislative session, NOT in January. It passed, but negotiations continued: the utilities all so testified. Where’s the interference?3) “not allow them to run their natural course, after which time the PSB would, as normal, decide if the proposed contracts met the public good.” Negotiations DID run their natural course, and the PSB DID continue, as normal, to hold hearings, take testimony, and receive final briefs and reply briefs from the parties. The PSB is precluded by a 2006 law from issuing a “final decision” in the absence of a legislative vote.4) “The only reason for imposing an artificial deadline was: 1) so that Shumlin would have an excuse to hold a vote to shut VY down; 2) to tell the utilities: beware, we may not relicense the party you are negotiating with, and therefore you’d better be negotiating alternative contracts with other generators; and 3) to convey the message to VY: we might not relicense you (by holding a vote about safety that we will later pretend was not about safety).” Talk about fantasies!!Other than your ignoring all of the known facts and creating new ones, you have a great theory going. Keep at it.

4. But was it the Vermont shore or the NH shore?

5. We interrupt this comment thread to bring you this newsflash: Today, Gov. Peter Shumlin issued a press release related to Vermont Yankee WITHOUT mentioning “Entergy Louisiana.” I believe that is a first.The comment came in response to the finding of tritium on the shores of the Connecticut River.His statement: “I am very concerned about the latest findings from the Vermont Health Department. Confirmation that tritium has reached the shoreline of the Connecticut River is further evidence of the immediate need for more extraction wells and increased monitoring of the situation.”We return to the comment thread – already in progress.

6. “What I am saying — now for the third time — is that if Entergy had successfully negotiated contracts in 2008 or earlier, it would have served THEIR interests.”Um, why is it “Entergy’s” burden, and not the utilities’ burden, or at least both sides’ burden, to successfully negotiate contracts? Or, is what you mean, that it was Entergy’s burden to conclude a deal by just accepting whatever demand the utulities may have been making? Welcome to your bias, sir.And, no, you needn’t have repeated — for the third time — your theory that if VY had successfully negotiated contracts with the Vermont utlities VY would be relicensed by now and we’d all be happy. We heard it the first time. We get your theory. And I believe it’s fantasy. Repeating it three times or more doesn’t make it any less a fantasy.BTW, your recitation of the relevant history (as you see it) only proves that by the beginning of the legislative session in January, 2009, if not earlier, the political climate against VY was already so hostile that Shumlin and Smith felt at liberty to attempt to interfere with and minipulate the PRIVATE contract negotiations between VY and the utilities. In the first place, Shumlin had absolutely no business and no reason to put a gun to VY’s head. Second, there was no rational basis for the so-called contract deadline. It was completely arbitrary and artificial. There was no reason whatsoever for political leaders to interfere with the negotiations and not allow them to run their natural course, after which time the PSB would, as normal, decide if the proposed contracts met the public good. The only reason for imposing an artifical deadline was: 1) so that Shumlin would have an excuse to hold a vote to shut VY down; 2) to tell the utilities: beware, we may not relicense the party you are negotiating with, and therefore you’d better be negotiating alternative contracts with other generators; and 3) to convey the message to VY: we might not relicense you (by holding a vote about safety that we will later pretend was not about safety). At absolute best, he interfered where he had no business interfering. At worst, he doomed the entire process. You can keep believing your fantasy that if only VY had concluded contracts we’d all now be looking at PPAs and that VY would be relicensed and that the current impasse is all VY’s fault. And whether or not conditional contracts had been reached, the 2009 Legislature was owned and controlled by VPIRG, and aspiring gubernatorial candidate Pete I-need-to-use-VY-as-a-political-punching-bag-to-win-the-Democratic-nomination Shumlin was going to try to shut VY down.Please don’t repeat for a fourth or fifth time your theory that everything is all VY’s fault.Thanks.

7. Thanks, Murphy, for telling me what I think. It’s always nice to know that I can count on someone like you — completely unbiased, objective, and ever attentive to the facts — to know better than I do what I think. But just for the record, I have not suggested here or elsewhere that Peter Shumlin is the good guy in all this, and even though I’m a nuclear opponent, I’m really not “blaming” VY.And no, I was not privy to the negotiations; I said just that above. What I am saying — now for the third time — is that if Entergy had successfully negotiated contracts in 2008 or earlier, it would have served THEIR interests. Specifically, they would probably have gotten legislative approval to move forward, and if favorable power contracts were in place, PSB approval as well. I suggested that contracts COULD easily have been negotiated in 2008 OR EARLIER, because electricity market prices were high and expected to go only higher. (Nothing prevented Entergy from beginning negotiations on these contracts as early as they wished).Now, let’s review the facts as we know them. As Tom reminds us above, Entergy relied heavily on the supposedly HUGE value of the RSAs. They said so in their public pronouncements, in testimony to the PSB and in testimony to the legislature. In 2008, if I’m not mistaken, everyone but me assumed that the RSAs would provide hundreds of millions of dollars of value to Vermont ratepayers. (I argued that the rate value would be close to zero, which right now, looks like a pretty good guess, and that the only value would be as an insurance policy.) Meanwhile, the utilities said both in private and public that they supported relicensing, and that they wanted to purchase power (albeit a bit less than presently) from Entergy.All that said, it is possible that Entergy proposed a great deal and the utilities said no to it, either because they were consistently lying to everyone (including to the PSB under oath) or just out of sheer perversity. It’s possible, but not really very plausible. Everything I’ve seen, read, and heard (including direct discussions with the utilities) suggests that Entergy made no such proposal.Now, let’s look in more detail at your explanation concerning the political climate. In particular, let’s go back to mid-legislative session 2009, when Jim Douglas and Entergy were putting heavy pressure on the legislature to hold a vote despite the fact that there were no contracts. Unless you believe that this was an act of political suicide, it’s pretty hard to avoid the inference that neither Entergy nor Douglas would have been putting on the pressure for a vote at that time if they believed the outcome would be negative, regardless of how Peter Shumlin felt on the matter. That, in turn, suggests that your political climate theory was WRONG at that point: the utilities would have been swimming WITH the political climate if they had assented to a deal, not against it. But unless you have some evidence that the legislature was against VY before it was for it, before it was against it, this inference is perfectly consistent with MY suggestion that the political climate was NOT opposed to a reasonable deal at that time OR at any earlier time.As a response to the pressure, Shumlin and Smith took the position that it would be foolhardy for the legislature to take a vote as important as this one in the absence of key, pertinent information: namely, the future price of VY power. So they said they WOULD hold the vote during that session, but ONLY if power contracts were presented by a given date, after which, they argued, the legislature would not have adequate time to consider the issue. The deadline passed with no contracts, and no vote was held.Perhaps Shumlin had already decided to oppose VY by then and his motivation in delaying the vote was to prevent being steamrolled by the governor and his colleagues. Or perhaps, as it appeared to me at the time, he was simply keeping his options open. What’s clear is that if his position HAD already changed, HE didn’t feel that he had the votes to kill relicensing, and THAT again contradicts YOUR theory that the political climate was what killed these negotiations, and is completely consonant with mine.Clearly, by Feb. 2010, the political climate in Vermont HAD changed and the Senate vote confirmed that. Actually, that change was already apparent by the time Jay Thayer’s letter to the PSB was released in December of 2009. So, at some point between spring,2009 and the end of that year, the political climate in Vermont changed, as did Shumlin’s position. (What a coincidence!) Meanwhile, electricity market prices COLLAPSED, changing expectations from the 9 cents range for 2012 to the high 5 cent to low 6 cents range, making it MUCH more difficult for Entergy to present a favorable price than it had been earlier. The 6.1 cents price which we KNOW, on the public record, Entergy offered, would have looked like a MUCH better deal in late 2008 than it did in late 2009.In sum, we have 2 theories: yours is not consonant with any reasonable interpretation of ANY of the facts until sometime after around March of 2009: it flies in the face both of high power rates in the markets AND of the political climate up to that date.Mine, on the other hand, is consonant with ALL of the known facts: namely, that the economic climate for negotiations was exceedingly favorable for Entergy through January 2009, and the political climate at least a few months longer. At some point during in 2009, both the economic and political changed, clearly worsening Entergy’s position. (Again, it’s not much of a reach to infer that the change in the political climate was DUE to the change in both the economic/rate climate and the fact that negotiations were clearly not going anywhere fast.)

8. From your fifth paragraph: “. . . and the politics looked right to him . . .”Amen to that.As far as admitting that you’ve been an anti-nuclear activist for 25+ years, your open admission doesn’t solve what I view as the problem. It’s not just that you have an opinion and are entitled to it (a proposition that I would agree with). It’s that your bias serves as a filter for deciding which facts are relevant and which are not, and for interpreting the ones that make it through your filter.You were not privy to the negotiations between VY and the utilities. You have absolutely no idea what bargaining positions the utilities took — how much power they asked for, at what price, and for how long. Your theory that if VY had been more forthcoming in PPA negotiations in 2009, Shumlin would have allowed the PSB to go forward with VY’s relicensure application is an utter and total fantasy; a fantasy that is not supported by any known facts and is contrary to the political reality of Vermont; a fantasy that is based on your personal interpretation of a conversation you allegedly had with a politican who is already a legend in Vermont for speaking out of both sides of his mouth (to put it nicely); and a fantasy that of course fits nicely with your belief that VY is the bad guy and Shumlin is the good guy.I am not biased in favor of VY. I am biased against political dogma of any kind, which certainly includes the anti-nuke religion in Vermont, and against the unscruplousness of certain politicians who exploit these dogmas for crass electoral purposes.Good luck.

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